{"@context":"http://iiif.io/api/presentation/3/context.json","id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/iiif/154dn41r8b/manifest","type":"Manifest","label":{"en":["Shmukler, Gennady"]},"logo":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/082/original/TheBreman_SecondaryMark_Horizontal_Blue_Black.png?1713640889","metadata":[{"label":{"en":["Date"]},"value":{"en":["2006-07-28 (captured)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Language"]},"value":{"en":["English (primary)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Format"]},"value":{"en":["video"]}},{"label":{"en":["Source"]},"value":{"en":["William Breman Jewish Heritage Museum","Esther and Herbert Taylor Oral History Collection","Jewish Oral History Project of Atlanta"]}},{"label":{"en":["Description"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eGennady Shmukler was interviewed by Sandra Berman and an unknown interviewer on July 28, 2006 in Atlanta, Georgia.\u003c/p\u003e (general)","\u003cp\u003eGennady Shmukler was born in 1956 in Lvov, Ukraine, to Lev and Ida Shmukler. Growing up, his parents quietly embraced their Jewish heritage but open expression risked harassment and social rejection. The sting of antisemitism became deeply personal when, after working hard throughout high school, Gennady was denied entrance to a Ukrainian university solely because of his religion. Undeterred, he enrolled at a university in Gomel, Belarus the next year and completed a degree in Mathematics and Computer Programming. After graduating and returning to Lvov in 1979, Gennady’s decided to apply to leave the Soviet Union. \u003cbr\u003eIn February 1980, after months of waiting and anxious anticipation, Gennady, his wife Anna, and their young daughter received permission to emigrate. They traveled to Austria and then Italy, where they awaited visas to the United States. Finally, in May 1980, the Shmukler family landed in New York and, thanks to the support of Jewish organizations, settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.\u003cbr\u003eGennady quickly found work as a computer programmer. Unable to find a job in her field as a civil engineer, Anna retrained as a hairdresser. Gennady’s parents and Anna’s parents were able to join them in Milwaukee and the family settled into their new lives. After a few years, Gennady began seeking new professional opportunities and accepted a job offer in Atlanta, Georgia.\u003cbr\u003eRelocating to Atlanta marked a new chapter. Both Gennady and Anna enrolled at Georgia Tech, eager to further their education. Anna soon found work in civil engineering, and they purchased their first home. By the mid-1980s, they had welcomed two more children, and both their parents had moved to Atlanta, bringing the extended family together once again.\u003cbr\u003eJoining a local synagogue, the Shmuklers quickly became active in Atlanta’s Jewish community. A mission trip to Israel inspired them to become active in the Atlanta Jewish Federation. Gennady joined the Young Leadership Division and served on the Atlanta Jewish Federation Resettlement Committee. Recognizing the needs of the growing number of Jewish Soviet refugees arriving in Atlanta during the 1980s, Gennady co-founded the Russian Club, a volunteer group devoted to helping the newcomers secure housing, navigate job searches, and adjust to their new lives. Through these efforts, the Shmuklers built an extensive network of friends.\u003cbr\u003eToday, Gennady and Anna still call Atlanta home. Gennady works for the Metro Atlanta Rapid Authority, and both remain active members of Atlanta’s Jewish community.\u003c/p\u003e (bioghist)","\u003cp\u003eShmukler provides an overview of his youth in Lvov, Ukraine. He discusses the impact of Soviet antisemitism on his life. Shmukler explains the challenges of applying to leave the Soviet Union. He recalls leaving the Soviet Union and waiting to come to the United States. Shmukler describes what he expected from a life in the United States. He outlines his early years in the United States. Shmukler talks about moving to Atlanta. He recounts the community of family and friends they established in Atlanta. Shmukler chronicles his involvement with the Atlanta Jewish Federation. He compares his path to citizenship with that of current immigrants. Shmukler considers the opportunities American citizenship had given his family.\u003c/p\u003e (scope content)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Rights Statement"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eAll rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, recorded by any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written consent of the William Breman Jewish Heritage Museum.\u003c/p\u003e"]}}],"summary":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eGennady Shmukler was interviewed by Sandra Berman and an unknown interviewer on July 28, 2006 in Atlanta, Georgia.\u003c/p\u003e","\u003cp\u003eGennady Shmukler was born in 1956 in Lvov, Ukraine, to Lev and Ida Shmukler. Growing up, his parents quietly embraced their Jewish heritage but open expression risked harassment and social rejection. The sting of antisemitism became deeply personal when, after working hard throughout high school, Gennady was denied entrance to a Ukrainian university solely because of his religion. Undeterred, he enrolled at a university in Gomel, Belarus the next year and completed a degree in Mathematics and Computer Programming. After graduating and returning to Lvov in 1979, Gennady\u0026rsquo;s decided to apply to leave the Soviet Union.\u0026nbsp;\u003cbr /\u003eIn February 1980, after months of waiting and anxious anticipation, Gennady, his wife Anna, and their young daughter received permission to emigrate. They traveled to Austria and then Italy, where they awaited visas to the United States. Finally, in May 1980, the Shmukler family landed in New York and, thanks to the support of Jewish organizations, settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.\u003cbr /\u003eGennady quickly found work as a computer programmer. Unable to find a job in her field as a civil engineer, Anna retrained as a hairdresser. Gennady\u0026rsquo;s parents and Anna\u0026rsquo;s parents were able to join them in Milwaukee and the family settled into their new lives. After a few years, Gennady began seeking new professional opportunities and accepted a job offer in Atlanta, Georgia.\u003cbr /\u003eRelocating to Atlanta marked a new chapter. Both Gennady and Anna enrolled at Georgia Tech, eager to further their education. Anna soon found work in civil engineering, and they purchased their first home. By the mid-1980s, they had welcomed two more children, and both their parents had moved to Atlanta, bringing the extended family together once again.\u003cbr /\u003eJoining a local synagogue, the Shmuklers quickly became active in Atlanta\u0026rsquo;s Jewish community. A mission trip to Israel inspired them to become active in the Atlanta Jewish Federation. Gennady joined the Young Leadership Division and served on the Atlanta Jewish Federation Resettlement Committee. Recognizing the needs of the growing number of Jewish Soviet refugees arriving in Atlanta during the 1980s, Gennady co-founded the Russian Club, a volunteer group devoted to helping the newcomers secure housing, navigate job searches, and adjust to their new lives. Through these efforts, the Shmuklers built an extensive network of friends.\u003cbr /\u003eToday, Gennady and Anna still call Atlanta home. Gennady works for the Metro Atlanta Rapid Authority, and both remain active members of Atlanta\u0026rsquo;s Jewish community.\u003c/p\u003e","\u003cp\u003eShmukler provides an overview of his youth in Lvov, Ukraine. He discusses the impact of Soviet antisemitism on his life. Shmukler explains the challenges of applying to leave the Soviet Union. He recalls leaving the Soviet Union and waiting to come to the United States. Shmukler describes what he expected from a life in the United States. He outlines his early years in the United States. Shmukler talks about moving to Atlanta. He recounts the community of family and friends they established in Atlanta. Shmukler chronicles his involvement with the Atlanta Jewish Federation. He compares his path to citizenship with that of current immigrants. Shmukler considers the opportunities American citizenship had given his family.\u003c/p\u003e"]},"requiredStatement":{"label":{"en":["Attribution"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eAll rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, recorded by any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written consent of the William Breman Jewish Heritage Museum.\u003c/p\u003e"]}},"provider":[{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/aboutus","type":"Agent","label":{"en":["William Breman Jewish Heritage Museum"]},"homepage":[{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/","type":"Text","label":{"en":["William Breman Jewish Heritage Museum"]},"format":"text/html"}],"logo":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/082/original/TheBreman_SecondaryMark_Horizontal_Blue_Black.png?1713640889","type":"Image"}]}],"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/302/325/small/Shmukler_Gennady.mp4_1770752736.jpg?1770752737","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325","type":"Canvas","label":{"en":["Media File 1 of 1 - Shmukler_Gennady.mp4"]},"duration":4455.59983,"width":640,"height":360,"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/302/325/small/Shmukler_Gennady.mp4_1770752736.jpg?1770752737","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/content/1","type":"AnnotationPage","items":[{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/content/1/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"painting","body":{"id":"https://aviary-p-thebreman.s3.wasabisys.com/collection_resource_files/resource_files/000/302/325/original/Shmukler_Gennady.mp4?1770752735","type":"Video","format":"video/mp4","duration":4455.59983,"width":640,"height":360},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325","metadata":[]}]}],"annotations":[{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["Shmukler, Gennady [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e We will start by you saying your name and, as you can imagine, these questions will be sort of a chronological progression. Therefore, please state your name, and the city that you were born in.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=0.0,11.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/2","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e My name is Gennady Shmukler. I was born in the city of Lvov in Ukraine.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=11.0,17.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/3","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e So, we would like to start by you telling us a little bit about your early childhood, the life you spent, the Jewish interaction in the community, whether in the family you guys had Jewish traditions, et cetera.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=17.0,31.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/4","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay. I was born in Lvov in 1956. The city of Lvov is located in the westernmost part of Ukraine, about 40 miles from the Polish border. As a matter of fact, this was a Polish city until September 17th of 1939, when Russia took possession. So, the city had a long Jewish tradition. I believe it had one of the largest concentration camps called Janowska in the city, which had 140,000 or 160,000 Jews killed. By the time I was born and when I was growing up, the Jewish presence was significant. However, Jewish institutions were almost non-existent. The last operational synagogue was closed in 1962. I remember I was six years old. I was there for Yom Kippur. Soon afterwards, it was closed and turned into a gym for one of the local colleges. The family had a lot of Jewish traditions, but they were not very easy to follow. My parents were always preoccupied in finding matzah for holidays, for Passover. Obviously, my mom always observed Yom Kippur and Rosh HaShanah, but the rest of the holidays were kind of hard to observe because very often we didn't know which day of the calendar they fall on, what kind of traditions are required. Rabbis and such were nonexistent, but only place where you could find somebody speaking Hebrew was at the Jewish cemetery where some poor, Hebrew-speaking gentleman would read Kaddish if you gave him a few kopecks and such. So, inside the family we had a lot of Jewish interactions, and we talked about the Jewish history, and achievements, and things like that. As I was growing up, most of my friends were Jewish. When I turned into a teenager year 16, 17, 18, we were naturally very aware of our Jewishness, if for no other reason than we were denied entrance into higher education institutions like colleges and universities. I specifically was denied and you know when I first applied after graduation from school when I was 17. But the following year, I had to go to Belorussia, the current Belorussian city of Gomel, which had less antisemitism and where it was easier to get into college. I actually was able to get with flying colors into university in the [Faculty of Mathematics and Technologies of Programming at Francisk Skorina Gomel State University]. So, as soon as I graduated from university in 1979, the family had applied for the exit visa, and we were very lucky that this was right before the Olympics and the Russian government, Soviet government were very interested in keeping things quiet. At the time, they still had some hopes for successful 1980 Olympics in Moscow. So, we were given permission in December of 1979, literally a couple days before the Afghan War started. We left the Soviet Union in February of 1980.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/5","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e We will go back to that. We will return to that in just a moment. We skipped through maybe 30 years of chronology. You mentioned—I would like to return to specifically this—that the synagogue was closed. What was the aura of the Jewish community after events such as this happened? I imagine this was not the first or the last.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=221.0,243.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/6","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e I know that Jews were well positioned in the city, in the sense that a lot of the organizations, and factories, and huge enterprises had Jews involved in the technical positions. They were usually not in the management position, but the managers, the top, whether it's the president or directors or people running the enterprises, were relying heavily on Jews to actually do the work. So, the typical example would be a shoe factory where the Communist and the Russian would be in charge, but the chief engineer would be Jewish. And that was kind of typical. Now, of course, a lot of Jews were involved in small trade. They would be maybe fixing shoes, maybe selling flowers, things like that. A lot of them were working in stores. I don't think we had a very … I mean, the community was large, nobody quite knew exactly how many, but I know that when immigration to Israel started in the late 1960s and early 1970s, there were constantly people leaving. Yet there were a lot of Jews left, and I think there are still a lot of Jews left. There may be as many as a few thousand. So, I suspect the community was probably 20,000 to 40,000 people. It's kind of hard to say, but the Jewish kids stuck together, and spent time together, listening to “Hava Nagila,” and listening to the \"Voice of Israel\" [radio broadcast], and things like that. But there were very few, if any, Jewish per se events, because Jewish religion per such was not really supported or advertised. Studying Hebrew was almost non-existent until the very late 1970s, when people started living for Israel. So, I'm not sure there was quite Jewish life. There was a lot of Jewish-based interaction around holidays, maybe around a Jewish wedding. For example, when our wedding was held in 1976, some of the musicians were Jewish and they knew their clientele. We had 120 people at our wedding, most of them, of course, were Jews, because it was family and friends, and there was a lot of Jewish music played. But it was kind of a clandestine-type thing, I mean, we didn't have a chuppah, we didn't have the ketubah, we didn't have the synagogue to go to, we didn't have a rabbi who came to officiate the ceremony. But the tone of a lot of it was Jewish, you know, jokes, and music, and listening to the \"Voice of Israel,\" and things like that.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=243.0,393.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/7","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e So, it sounds like with the presence of communism in Russia at the time, there wasn't anything stopping this, except for sort of the overt advertisements as we have in America. But besides that, people were more or less open with it?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=393.0,410.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/8","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Yes, to a degree. I mean, when I was growing up, actually, I never advertised and actually got hurt quite a few times for being a Jew, because, you know, we didn't grow up in … There was no such thing as a Jewish area. We actually happened to live … Just by happenstance, our family happened to live right next to the old Jewish theater, which was there before 1939. But obviously we were surrounded. I mean, we were the only Jewish family in this whole eight building complex of probably a couple hundred families. You didn't advertise your Jewishness. You didn't go around, you know … Matter of fact, I didn't become self-aware or aware that I'm Jewish until I got into a fight because somebody called me a Jew and I didn't understand it. So, I came to my mom and I said, \"What does it mean?\" when I was six or seven years old. She explained to me that we're a little different than other people. I think if you look at us in the 1960s, our family, for example, we're just like everybody else. You know, we weren't any different in look, and clothes, and customs, and singular, except maybe in September, we would have Rosh HaShanah, and my mom would make gefilte fish or maybe ten days later, we would fast. I mean, my parents would fast but, no, we were not … We didn't stick out. We were not Jewish. We didn't have a synagogue to go to. We didn't have Jewish center to go to. We didn't have a Jewish community to go to. We didn't have Jews camps to go to, so when we … I guess the big … I remember barely 1967. I remember when the 1967 war [in Israel] started because this is when anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish propaganda started in earnest. But I remember a lot more 1973, where we … I was 17 at the time, a lot of my friends were talking about the fact that they would love to go to Israel and fight there because this was kind of like the mutual feeling of a lot of people. And that, basically, was our Jewish life. You know, we were in between ourselves in the small rooms, in small company, where you could trust people and most of them were Jews. You know, you could talk about Jewish things, Israel, and things like that, but in the population in general, you didn't go around with … You know, we didn't have … I didn't have a Magen David [Hebrew: shield of David; a six-pointed star] until I came out here. They were just not made. I'm sure we could go to some Jewish jeweler and ask him to make one, but wearing one in public was asking for trouble, especially if you were younger. Did I answer that?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=410.0,557.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/9","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Yes, certainly. Okay.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=557.0,558.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/10","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=558.0,558.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/11","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay. So, the group of people that you usually were around were Jews as well? Correct.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=558.0,566.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/12","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Correct.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=566.0,566.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/13","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Correct. Let us return for a moment to the moment when you entered the university and your first denial. We will go back to that for a minute. Sure.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=566.0,574.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/14","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Sure.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=574.0,574.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/15","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Sure. Certainly, researchers of Russia and people that live there have heard of these occurrences before. For the camera and for myself as well, I think many people still do not quite understand how this denial process happened. It was obviously very overt, correct?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=574.0,591.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/16","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Right. Well, here's what happened in my case. We had six higher education institutions in our city: university, polytechnical institute, and other institutes. I applied into one of them, and they were accepting 100 people. And the process of getting in entrances were basically four exams. So, you had your average GPA from school, which counted basically as a number, added to the results of four exams: two of them in math, one in physics, and one in language and literature. The exams in math and physics, one math exam and a physics exam, were what's called oral exam, which means you came and you basically answered a bunch of questions, and for however long the people who were examining you, they could ask you questions and give you problems to solve, and so on, and so forth, basically to try to figure out your knowledge of math and the physics. Now, on the written exams, where they really didn't know who you are, didn't know your name, didn't who you were, I aced those. But in the oral exams, I barely managed a C. Now granted, getting a D automatically disqualified you. You could not continue. As soon as you got a D in one of the exams, you were out of the running. So, I barely squeezed in a C, and when they added up all the numbers, you know, I had enough points to get through, but I wasn't in the list of the 100 people they posted at the end of the exam, you know, of who was accepted. So, my mom went to the dean and said, \"Why is that? Because my son certainly got more points than some of the people on the list.\" And he basically was very open with her. He said, \"We are accepting 100 people. There are already two Jews.\" And while those Jews didn't do … Basically I was a third. They didn't any better than I did, but they either had connections or … For whatever reason, I was the third one. He said, \"We cannot take the third Jew. Two percent was our quota.\" Now, the quota was rarely … People were rarely that open, but you could look at a lot of … Like, for example, my friend got into a class of 50 and he was the only Jew there, you know, so the number was pretty much enforced uniformly, but it was rarely spoken about. So, when you were trying to get into college … I mean, some colleges were completely closed to Jews. Some of the most prestigious ones in Moscow, for example, universities and things like that, they had no Jews at all. That was an official, well-known fact. But other colleges, you know, they would still allow a small quota, small percentage. Two percent was a well-known number and very often, empirically, you could see that that was the number. My mom happened to be told explicitly that the third Jew just doesn't have a space.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=591.0,749.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/17","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Then, you said that you applied to another university?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=749.0,751.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/18","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Right, a year later when there was another, cause all the exams are held at the same time. You apply to whatever college you want to. Exams always start August 1st. They're always over by August 20th and by August 25th, they post a list of people accepted. I went to university in Gomel, Belorussia, which happened to be a lot easier on antisemitism and accepting Jews. There, 150 people were accepted. I was one of them, and there were 12 Jews, which was a huge amount in Ukraine. See, Ukraine traditionally was more antisemitic than Belorussia, for example, was. And Russia, with the exception of Moscow and Leningrad, were not that antisemitic. As a matter of fact, there were a lot of places in Russia where they didn't even know who the Jews were. I mean, they hated them, but they didn't know who they are. I know that kind of second-hand because my dad used to travel to a lot far off places in Russian. He would often come back and tell us stories about talking to people who said, \"Oh, we hate Jews. We absolutely despise Jews.\" And when he would ask, \"Do you know who the Jews are? Do you know I'm a Jew,\" they said, \"No, you're a great guy. I mean, we just hate the Jews.\"","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=751.0,821.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/19","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e So, in a year, you qualified?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=821.0,822.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/20","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e In a year, I entered again and I went there. I basically I got in with flying colors, and spent five years, and graduated in the top ten percent of the class.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=822.0,833.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/21","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e I see. So, how long after your graduation did you begin to contemplate immigration to the United States?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=833.0,841.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/22","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e WelI, I started contemplating actually when I was in university, but my mom insisted on me first getting a diploma and then us leaving. We were extremely lucky. Had I been a year behind and we tried to get out in the middle of 1980 [or] in the summer of 1980, instead of summer of 1979, we probably would be stuck there for years because pretty much after the Olympics, the doors closed. There was a little trickle, which still came out in 1981, but by 1982 everything was shut down, until 1988 when [Mikhail] Gorbachev came in, and perestroika and glasnost started. Then, people started living in droves. So, we were kind of lucky in that. I actually wanted to leave early. I mean, my desire to leave was very much reinforced when I wasn't allowed to get into college. I graduated from the most prestigious school in the city. [I was] well known. I won what they call the Mathematical Olympics. I was well poised, if not for my nationality. I was well poised to go into the pick of the colleges. As a matter of fact, everybody in our class … Ours was a very Jewish class. The graduating class was 30, 31 people [and] 12 or 13 of them were Jews in our high school. Most of the Jews didn't get into colleges. All the non-Jews got in. So, after all that stuff, when you don't get accepted, where you get humiliated by getting some really … I mean, I'd never had C's before I went to the entrance exam to college and I knew I'm well-prepared in both physics and mathematics. It just happened to be oral exams. They know your name, they see you, and they pretty much decide. And of course, some of it is based on a specific person who is examining you, but most of them, unfortunately, didn't like the Jews and were following the direction of not accepting Jews. So, that's when my desire kind of got reinforced. And I was growing up, and maturing, and reading, and listening, and watching … By mid-1970s, you know, 1977, 1978, we were ready to go, but I agreed, kind of decided not to argue with my mom about leaving early because one of the dangers of leaving in the middle of university or any kind of college studies is that you could be drafted into the army. As soon as you drop out, you could be conceivably drafted into the army because you no longer had the reason to postpone the army engagement. I almost got drafted and I probably would have ended up in Afghanistan. But my mother found a person to bribe, and I got a six-month delay. That was enough for us to leave.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=841.0,991.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/23","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e This was how many years after you graduated?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=991.0,994.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/24","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e This was the year I graduated, 1979.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=994.0,996.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/25","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e The year that you graduated. Let us talk now about this stage. So, the immigration process … Explain to us how one applied and all of the …","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=996.0,1010.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/26","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay. Well, I can speak about me and my family because when we emigrated, my wife, and I, and our young daughter—she was two years old at the time—we lived with my in-laws. Obviously, a well-known problem is the living space in Russia, in USSR [Union of Soviet Socialist Republics]. So, we lived my in-laws: my father-in-law, my mother-in-law, and my brother-in-law. Six of us living in the same place. We knew that in order for us to succeed and get a permit, permission to leave, we would have to empty the flat, because one of the very important deciding factors was the desirability of your living space. Now, my in-laws happened to have a flat in the center of the city, and a large one, too. By Soviet standards, it was a large flat. It was a well-known fact that if somebody higher up in the administration of the government really … liked your flat, you could really expedite the permit process and everything else. When I received my diploma in June of 1979, in the city of Gomel in Belorussia, I moved back to Lvov, to where my family lived, my parents lived, and my in-laws, and we immediately started the applying process. So, the first thing you needed to do is you needed an application from a place called OVIR. OVIR stands for Office of Visas and Registrations. So, you get the permit and basically get the list of requirements. And the list the requirements usually consisted of proof that you are no longer a member of the Komsomol or [Communist Party of the Soviet Union], that you don't owe any money to the place where you work, you don't own any money to the places where you live, and also what they called characteristic, which is basically a written recommendation to your character, and so on, and so forth from the place where you work. So, that was pretty much the list of things you needed to do and of course, you had to pay about 1600 rubles, I believe, at the time for each passport. And that was actually a fee for being stripped for citizenship, because you couldn't leave as a citizen of USSR. You could only leave without citizenship and that fee was, for each passport, about 1600 rubles, I believe. So, every family … We had six members of the family. Everybody had to worry about his own thing. You know, obviously, my in-laws had to worry about living space and apartment, making sure that the central servicing place of the building would give them the release saying they don't owe anything. And they had to pay for the repairs, which never were taken place, you know. So, basically, it's a kind of a bribe. So, you go and you pay for like if you were repainting your place and fixing it, but you never really do that. They just keep the money. I had to basically get kicked out of Komsomol, which is the youth organization. It was a semi-okay process for me because I was new to the place. When I finished university, I got kind of detached from there and I came to the end since I didn't work anywhere. I couldn't find any work, as a matter of fact, even though I had a diploma from a university and everything else. But as soon as they ask you if you're a member of the Komsomol, of the youth organization, I say, \"No,\" and they immediately know that you're in the process of leaving. So, then, of course, I had to get the characteristics, you know, the recommendation. Everybody had to do that. So, that was basically the process. You know, you were different stages of … Of course, you know, like my mother, for example, when she was leaving, or my in-laws, who worked for 20 some years in an organization, depending on how well positioned you were and how well you knew the people responsible for issuing those kind of recommendation, characteristics, it could be a very painful process or it could be a very easy process. In some cases, people who even came and as much as asked … Because characteristic, the interesting thing is you would ask for characteristic for almost anything significant. Like if you wanted to go abroad, just working there, just go to visit maybe Poland, or Czech Republic, or Bulgaria, you would need to get characteristic because the decision was based to allow you or not, whatever. Even if you apply for apartment or if you wanted to buy a car, very often you need characteristic, like a recommendation [saying], \"Such and such is a good worker. Blah, blah blah\". But the one which OVIR required to bring always had to say at the bottom, \"This characteristic was given because of the person wants to leave.\" And obviously, you could not hide the fact that you're planning to leave, because you had to go to the place you work. You have to say, \"I want to leave.\" In some cases, people lost jobs and, in some cases, they got to keep their jobs. And in some cases, they were called to a big meeting of the entire company or their department, and they were chastised, and they were grilled, and they were just humiliated for hours. In other cases, it was just a pro forma, kind of a formality. You could almost sign one yourself and they put the stamp, and sign it, and you bring it to OVIR. But for six people, we had our own trials and tribulations. That took most of the summer. By the end of August, early September, we had all the documents, all the money and everything else. So, we brought them all to OVIR. We waited in line. The OVIR of course, they, you know, the wonderful way of humiliating you at every turn. OVIR would open three days, maybe two days a week. I forgot exactly, but just maybe a couple hours. And a number of people … It's all kind of almost like county-based type stuff. So, we were living in a county of maybe 150, 200,000 people and of them, the percentage of Jews and number of Jews wanting to leave was significant. But the place would only open maybe for an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon, an hour in the morning where you can get an application, an hour in the afternoon where you could drop them off, you know. So, obviously, there's always a line, which was a great way to communicate, and meet people, and find out that they're also planning to leave. So, we go, and we stay in line, and we drop off the applications, and they find deficiencies, and you go, and you bring the rest of the stuff. So, our waiting period started somewhere at the end of August 1979, early September. Traditional time would be three to six months. In our case, it was almost exactly three months, because about December 10th, we got a little postcard. Jews in our city and others knew exactly the postcard of this color and the size meant one thing, and a postcard of this color and this size meant different things. Ours seemed to be the one saying that you are allowed, you are permitted. So, my father-in-law officially went and picked it up. They said, \"You are officially allowed to leave the Soviet Union. You have to do this, and this.\" They give you 20 days, but you can ask for extension, which is exactly what we did, because 20 days is nowhere near enough. I mean, you cannot completely uproot your life thinking you're gonna get permission. You cannot live your life like you lived before because you think you're going to be denied. So, you're kind of in a suspended thing. You found a few places, maybe sold a few things, and you agreed with some people that if you are gonna leave, you're gonna sell them your furniture, you're gonna sell them your TV, you're gone sell them your books, or things like that. But you don't really know until you get permission. So, we got permission and things started really, you know, quickly developing. Then, we … So, again, you have to run to all the places where you got the signatures before saying that you no longer own them anything. But just, G-d forbid, in the last three months or something, you went to a place and maybe borrowed the rent and something, you gotta still get the paper again that you don't owe anything to them. Then, you just basically start packing. You start packing, you start looking for things you can … The requirements kept changing. They were getting tighter and tighter all the time as to how much you can take with you. You know, when we were leaving, we were allowed about seventy pounds per person [as a] carry on. I mean, that's all we were allowed to take. So, a family like ours, three people, we could have approximately 200 pounds of luggage and that should include everything. And we're leaving in the middle of the winter, so that means warm clothes, and summer clothes, and all of your earthly possessions, and things like that. So, that's basically … You know, you sell everything you have and you try to turn it into money and then, using that money, obviously you can't take any money abroad. You're allowed to change 90 rubles into $125, $130, totally artificial and stupid Soviet exchange of rubles into dollar. And then what you're trying to do, you're going to buy those little things you can later sell for currency, like vodka. You're allowed a liter of vodka per person. So, people go and buy two bottles of vodka. And then, when they cross the border and come to Austria, or come to Italy, or any other place they stop, they sell vodka for some small currency. Obviously, they sell it cheap. But it's about the only way to take the money out with you.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1010.0,1530.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/27","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e What specifically was it about America that you chose to come here, as opposed to maybe Israel or Australia or somewhere in Europe?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1530.0,1536.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/28","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Good question. When we left, when we crossed the border, which was the day I'll never forget, that was the 18th of February 1980, when we crossed border, our first stop was Vienna, Austria. When you come to Austria, some people were flying in. Obviously, we took the train. So, at the train station, Sokhnut meets you, Sokhnut representatives. They basically place you in a hotel and the next couple of days they interview you and they ask you where you want to be. Matter of fact, right there at the train station, if you said you're going to Israel, they would immediately take you under guard and take you to the place where every couple of days a plane was flying to Israel. We decided to go to the United States. And the reason we decided to the United States is because, as I mentioned, I just spent a very nervous month or two trying to avoid the army draft and things like that. We felt like going to Israel would be almost repeating that same … Well, not repeating the experience, but getting into kind of the same situation because soon after arriving to Israel, I would probably be drafted. I had a two-year-old kid and it was not really our idea of starting off. We also felt that the climate as well as the language were too foreign. I mean, I studied English in school even though it was kind of not very intense, but I knew a few English words, and I was listening to the American music, and things like that. So, we knew a lot more about America. And we had very good relatives in America, because by that time, my father's sister and her daughter were already in Atlanta [Georgia]. Another cousin of mine was living in New York. Some of our friends were already New York and Chicago [Illinois], so we had … And of course, currently we had a lot of relatives in Israel as well. But most of those, or a lot of those relatives were very patriotic. They were saying that if they had a choice, which of course in the early 1970s most of them didn't, they would probably go to America. As a matter of fact, we had some very good friends who left in 1971, went to Israel. By 1975, they were already in the United States. So, all of that together kind of added up to our desire or our attempt to go. Now, other places in Europe … Now, we were offered, because we were 23, both of us, and had a young two-year-old kid, we were offered the chance to go to Germany, which we couldn't even think about it. Germany was the last thing on our mind. Some people in Italy, which is our next station. Some people in Italy, for example, would go and apply to go to Australia, or New Zealand, or Canada because those would take months if not years. They just used this as a prepaid kind of vacation in Italy. But we wanted to go the United States. We were anxious to go, and start working, and make a life, you know, start building something. We really did not want to languish for a year somewhere in the suburbs of Rome, somewhere in Italy, however beautiful the place was, not knowing whether we're going to get accepted, or not to take us in, or not … Plus, you know, America was always some place which we always thought was the best. Of all the places in the world, it was the place to go. So, why wait? So, we spent our two months in Rome. We basically filled out our papers in Austria, and they got transferred to Rome. We got notification, \"This is the flight. April 30th, 1980, be such and such place, and the bus will pick you up,\" and everything else.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1536.0,1742.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/29","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Which organization was this?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1742.0,1745.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/30","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e After we were done with Sokhnut, we were basically turned over to HIAS [Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society]. And HIAS basically took care of us all the way from like third or fourth day in Austria all the way until we got to New York. The interesting thing is we really didn't know it was HIAS per se. I mean, we knew there was some organization. I mean, granted, when we grew up, we had no idea what Joint [American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee] is, what HIAS is. The previous generation heard the word Joint as the most derogatory word you could possibly imagine because in the early 1950s and late 1940s, there was a huge campaign against what they called cosmopolitans, cosmopolite [Russian], and they were supposedly all supported and sponsored by the Joint. But we had no idea what Joint is. By the time we grew up, the word Joint was not even mentioned. So, we just knew … Because we really didn't explore anything. You kind of get into a conveyor belt. You get met at the train station in Vienna with people, representatives, and they tell you, \"Load your baggage here, get on this bus, and go to this place.\" And then, in the hotel we were staying at, there would be a sign saying … Of course, every day we would go to the … I guess it's a HIAS office, and there you get filled out a paper, and they tell you to be there in such and such time. So, we get told that we have to be at the train station, and they give us a bus, and they deliver us to a train station, and they give us tickets to get on the train, and we get on a train, and overnight, we're in Italy. Again, in Italy, they pick you up on the busses, and they take you to the hotel. So, there was very little exploration, or very little, you know, we needed to do ourselves in order to do it. We were just following everybody else. Luckily at the time, 1979 set all records until late 1980s of number of people [that] left. Like 51,000 people, 54,000 left Soviet Union that year. In 1980, the first couple of months were just as intense, and then, of course, as the Olympics started and the doors shut, it was probably a smaller number, maybe 20 [or] 30,000 for the entire year, but most of them left at the beginning of the year. So, it was HIAS which was doing all of that stuff. They were the ones handling our papers and we would actually … Well, we lived just outside of Rome in a place called Ladispoli. We would go almost every other day to Rome, and we would go to HIAS. We would go and then there would be like a case worker there or something, a person who handled your case, and you would wait. You'd get to meet and they'd tell you, \"Okay, this is where we are. This is what you need to do. This is … Come back again,\" and so on and so forth.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1745.0,1897.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/31","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay. So, there was something like four months spent in Europe.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1897.0,1900.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/32","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Two in Italy, two and a half, yes. Two in Italy and two weeks in Vienna, yes.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1900.0,1904.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/33","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e And then you guys …","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1904.0,1906.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/34","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Right. April 30th, we arrived to …","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1906.0,1908.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/35","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Before we get into that, I would like to ask the following … Obviously, living in the Soviet Union and then going through the anxiety of knowing that you are about to enter America and into a new life, how were the images that you created for yourself and the anticipations? How were they at this point, before we enter into America?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1908.0,1927.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/36","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e You mean what kind of images I had?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1927.0,1929.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/37","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e What sort of imaginations you had about the life that was to come.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1929.0,1935.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/38","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Well, we had a lot of hope, but of course, when you're 23 years old, it's easy to have hopes. We had absolutely no idea what we were going to find in America, even though we all read the very famous book \"Odnoetazhnaya Amerika,\" you know, [Russian] \"One-storied America.\" We all read it. It was written in the 1930s, and it was a shock for everybody, I guess, who comes to the United States, because as soon as you leave the big city like New York or Chicago, it becomes basically one-storied America. We read it. You think you are prepared, but we still were very … I mean, what we imagine is New York lasting for miles and kilometers in state after state. We expected a place where you could have a car, something which in Russia we could only dream about, and you can have your own place to live. [That was] again, something we never had in the Soviet Union and actually didn't have any chance of having until, G-d forbid, your parents passed away and they left you an apartment, which is how my in-laws got an apartment, because their parents died. I mean, this is how you had an apartment in Russia. So, we imagined America as the very fun place. Because the way we grew up and the way our intellect processed things, all the best things we heard about, whether they were American or not, they were associated with America. So, in a way, when we left the Soviet Union, in our imagination, America was the best of everything in the world. I mean, this could have been an Italian product, or service, or movie, or music, but it was still kind of associated in our mind as America because … Funny thing was that while we were in Italy, some of the people we were surrounded by were getting letters from those who just left and went to America. And the letters were basically along the line of, \"You guys think that you got it nicely in Italy? Wait till you get to America. Things are half as cheap, and twice as good, and they're twice as plentiful.\" So, we had a lot of expectations, a lot of anticipation. But in a way … You mentioned we had a lot of anxiety leaving the Soviet Union, but we were just as anxious when we were in Europe, because we didn't know what to expect, you know. I mean, we came out with the higher education, with diplomas, but we had no idea whether we were going to find a job or not. Nineteen seventy-nine and 1980 were not a very good time in the United States to begin with, so it was a very anxious time. We just swapped one set of anxieties into another. But when you're 23 and you think that you're going to the best place in the world, it was easy to forget about those things and look forward to being able to buy the LP of the band you always listen to and could never get enough, buy a car, have an apartment, have a stereo system where you can listen to the music, have a TV, that type of stuff.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1935.0,2107.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/39","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e So, you entered America in August?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2107.0,2110.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/40","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e No, April 30th, 1980.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2110.0,2114.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/41","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e And you immediately went to which city?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2114.0,2117.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/42","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay, well, the process was like this: we took Alitalia [a defunct Italian airline] flights from Rome to New York. I believe it was JFK [John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, New York]. I'm not sure exactly. We got processed there because we come with this big yellow package, which we were told to guard with our life. Apparently, it had all the required documents because we were coming in as refugees. We had all the right things filled out because, you know, back in Rome before we left, we had to take a shot, we had to get the mental exam, and we had to go to the U.S. Embassy to get all the interviews and things like that. So, we arrived at JFK with a big yellow envelope, one head of the family like me, for the rest of the family. We get processed, which I don't even remember that whole thing, and we come out, and we get boarded on the bus, and we go to a hotel. Now, all those people traveling to New York, they were all basically picked up by the relatives and told to come back to HIAS, or I think in New York it's called NYANA [New York Association for New Americans], come back in a week or so. But those traveling farther on … We were traveling to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and we came about four or five o'clock in the afternoon. We got to spend a night at the hotel, and we were picked up in the morning by volunteers, I guess, and brought back to the airport. It was early. We are talking five or six o' clock in the morning. We took an eight o'clock flight to Milwaukee, and by nine o'clock, we landed in Milwaukee, where my in-laws' friends met us. Again, we were in a case worker from Jewish Federation, and we were told in a week or so … My in-laws' friends were very well involved in the Jewish Federation, so they knew people there, so everything was kind of on an informal basis. If we needed to find something out, we could always ask them. They called the Federation, called the caseworker. Caseworker tells them, \"Do this,\" or \"Come here,\" and that type of stuff. So, May 1st, 1980, Solidarity Day, we arrive to Milwaukee, and this is where our life starts. Our … Again, they were basically our sponsors or our volunteers, even though they happened to be an old-time friends of my in-laws. They immigrated in 1967, so they've lived in Milwaukee for almost 15 years by the time we got there. They had their kids already married off to Americans and they were well set up. So, this was a very good set of volunteers to have. They spoke Russian, and they spoke English, and they could help us out. They picked us up at the airport. They took us to one of their kids' house, where we stayed a couple of days until our apartment became available. They moved us into the apartment. We don't have to worry about anything because Jewish Federation is paying for the apartment. I don't know what the deposit and things like that, utilities, everything. So, we were kind of even oblivious of how much it cost until we started paying it ourselves in a couple of months. Then, they give us $60 every week for food, which was at the time, more than enough. I mean, you really had to go through all the aisles in the store to spend $60 for food. And that's how our life started. So, we get moved into this empty apartment and we go to … We drive … So, we see all of a sudden that this friend of ours, the volunteer, she came in and she said, \"I was just driving by, and I saw an old couch outside. Why don't we go pick it up?\" So, we picked up the old couch and we had a couch. Then, she already arranged for some mattresses for us to have. And then we went to one of the … Well, in Milwaukee they call it the rummage sale, but a garage sale. Every Saturday, she would drive by a garage sale, and she would get us something else, or we would get something else ourselves. First thing we bought was a color TV. I mean, we had some dollars from the exchange in the Soviet Union and some of the things we sold in Italy. So, we came with maybe $200 or $250. And the first $125 we spent was a used color TV, big set, 25-inch color TV. That was, heaven, because in Russia we didn't have a color TV. I mean, very few people had a color TV. So, we had this big empty room, and we had a color TV in the middle of it. And that's how we started.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2117.0,2363.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/43","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e How long did you guys spend your lives in this manner before you guys started working and began to think about moving to Atlanta?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2363.0,2373.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/44","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay. So, we're there May 1st. About May 5th, we move into our own apartment, and we start going through the job orientation and language classes of the Federation. A couple weeks later, we start working on things like resumes and basically, we know we need to go get a job. We know this is not going to last indefinitely. It's going to last for a while, but it's not going to last indefinitely. So, I asked somebody who lives not far from us … Oh, we bought a car. We bought a car. About two months later, we bought a car for $300. It had holes in [the] fenders, but hey, it was a car. So, we start talking to Russian people. Again, you go to Russian classes … I mean, to English classes, and you meet a lot of Russians, and you talk to them, and you find out that somebody had a very similar … I found out somebody had a very similarly education as mine. So, I get on the phone. That was another luxury we had. We had a phone the day we moved in. In Russia, in Soviet Union, my parents lived all their life and two years before we left, we finally got a phone. So, I called this guy. He happened to be my age. He graduated from university in a different city, but it was basically the same because all universities had very similar kind of programs. So, he comes over. He already had a car. He was there for about a year. He was already working. He comes in. We start talking. He says, \"Listen, you're going about your resume totally different way, totally wrong way. You're writing yourself as mathematician, which would be very hard to find. But you also took a lot of computer classes. You know a couple of computer languages. You're a computer programmer and there is a need for computer programming. So why don't you present yourself this way? You know, that, yes, you know math and your degree is in math, but you know computer science because it was your minor. So, why you don't kind of emphasize that?\" So, I make my resume that way and I go to the employment agencies, and I present myself in my broken English, and I try to explain I'm looking for a job. I go to a couple interviews and most of them are large banks, which is not what I was … You know, in any languages, I don't know like COBOL [Common Business-Oriented Language]. And then I get an interview with a small company and that company … A friend of mine drives me there because I can't even get there. I didn't have a car at the time. They talked to me and there was this Czech guy. I mean, he wasn't from Czechoslovakia; his parents were. But he looked at me and he said, \"Listen, I mean, my parents were immigrants like you. I want to give you a chance for a minuscule salary of $900 a month.\" He needed a programmer. He said, \"I'm going to take a chance. What am I going to lose?\" I mean, months later, when I was working already there and talking to people, I found out that there was really somewhat of an argument between this guy, who was the president and his vice president, who was very cautious. He said, \"You must be crazy, Joel. Joel, you must crazy hiring a guy who you don't even know anything about. He just got off the plane from abroad. He barely speaks English. You don't know what he knows.\" And the guy said, \"Listen, what do we risk? $900 a month. If we don't like him, we'll kick him out.\" But things worked out. So, I started my first job 15th of July, basically two and a half months after we arrived. And three days before that, I bought a car because I needed the car. It was 25 miles away. And basically, we immediately got off the support of the Jewish Federation, because as soon as I got the first check … It was a weekly check of exactly $172.50. I remember that. We needed exactly $167 to live, basically to pay for apartment, utilities, and food. So, we had about $5 every week left on things we could explore. So, we would go to a store like Walgreens, and we would just browse the aisles, and see all these incredible things. We didn't even know what they are. So, as soon we saved $10, we bought ourselves an instant camera, something else we never had in our life. Three weeks later, my wife has a birthday, August 9, and we have this instant camera where you push the button and a picture comes out. We still have those pictures. So, that's how we started. Of course, my wife didn't have the advantage of like I did. She didn't study English in school. She studied German. Totally useless, obviously, when you come to the United States. So, she goes longer to the classes and things like that. She picks up a little bit of English, but then, she decides to … She's a civil engineer and there is no job. She's going to one interview after another. Actually, she had very few interviews, but the interviews she did go to, I mean, there is no work. So, she says, \"You know what? I always wanted to be a hairdresser. I always want to cut hair and my mom would never hear about it,\" because in Russia, it was not a prestigious profession. It was a low-end profession, and all the Jewish kids were supposed to become engineers. So, she went to the college and they arranged, again the Jewish Federation arranged, helped her fill out all the papers, and the college itself helped, and obviously she got some grants. Somehow it was paid for her, because we only had to pay like $800 over the year for that education. She went for a year. This is where she picked up English, started talking, became comfortable, graduated a year later, first found a job washing hair and then, when we moved to Atlanta, she actually got a job as a beautician, as a hairdresser. But I am jumping ahead. Right.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2373.0,2688.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/45","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Right.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2688.0,2688.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/46","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Right. So, I started working and I made good progress. I surprised the people because obviously, you know, I was anxious, and I was studying, and I was reading. For about a year and a half, I was working there, and I'm getting constant raises, and I was getting to a good position, but I felt like this is not the ideal place for me for a number of reasons. But when I started looking … Because I was working with mini- and microcomputers at the time, there were no jobs in Milwaukee. I mean, this is Rust Belt. We're talking 1981, 1982. Meanwhile, everybody's going South. I mean everybody's going to Houston [Texas], and Dallas [Texas], and Atlanta, and Phoenix [Arizona], and California, and all that stuff. My father-in-law got a job with Bechtel Corporation in San Francisco [California]. They moved there at the end of 1981, so I figured I gotta start looking for a job somewhere else. I started sending resumes and they start flying me to interviews in California and we realized that we've got to move. We've got to move because there are no job opportunities for me in Milwaukee. There's no other place I can go to, and grow, and advance. So, a friend of mine, the same one who helped me with the job, and resume, and everything else … We hop in the car. We drive to Houston. But on the way, we stop in Atlanta, because that's where I have relatives. We come here literally on Sunday night and we interview all day Monday through headhunters and things. By Tuesday, we both have job offers. So, instead of going to Houston, we turn around, we drive back, we tell our respective wives, \"Pack, because we've got to start in a couple of weeks in Atlanta,\" and we turn in our apartment. We leave all the furniture and everything else, and we just basically … Well, the old furniture, [we left behind]. We rented a U-Haul for a few things and that was actually shared between two of us. And we come to Atlanta. That was April 1982.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2688.0,2803.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/47","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e And your in-laws, they were in San Francisco?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2803.0,2807.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/48","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e They were in San Francisco at the time.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2807.0,2809.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/49","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay. So, you came with your wife and your …","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2809.0,2811.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/50","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Just my wife and my daughter, exactly. And this is where our freedom started because we are no longer … I mean, my parents stayed in Milwaukee, my in-laws in San Francisco. There are just three of us here. Of course, I had a cousin here with husband and daughter here. So, we had a little bit of support system, but really, we knew literally five people in Atlanta when we moved here.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2811.0,2830.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/51","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e And you began with the job that you had interviewed for …","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2830.0,2832.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/52","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Right, and that was good because, you know, I knew where my job is. We rented an apartment right next to it, and we brought our car here, so I had … You know, we were all set and that gave us the freedom to start looking for a job for my wife. She found a job very quickly in the mall cutting hair. Then, soon thereafter, we talked to a neighbor who happened to be Russian. No, first we lived in apartment only three or four months, but there were a few Russian families there. This was right in the corner of Lavista [Road] and Briarcliff [Road], a very popular place. By that time, of course, most of the Russians who've lived there in early 1980s and in the late 1970s, they moved on. So, we rented the place in April and by July, we were actively looking for a house because one of the advantages of Atlanta, which is why I picked Atlanta, was the fact that the starter houses were still affordable. Our friends and classmates living in California, which is where I had a job offer as well, they paid three times as much for a small house, and the salaries were the same. I mean, I literally got within $1,000 offer between California and Atlanta, and yet, a house here was $60,000. A house there was $180,000. So, we started looking for a house, and we find one. By September 1st, we move into our first house. Both of us working, two cars. Our child starts daycare, I mean kindergarten, because she's five years old. And we're living in a nice area off Jimmy Carter [Boulevard], which at the time was very nice. It was nothing like it is today.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2832.0,2926.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/53","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e At what point did your in-laws and parents rejoin you in Atlanta?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2926.0,2930.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/54","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay, my in-laws came in summer of 1983 because my father-in-law got laid off from his wonderful job at Bechtel. He was contracting here and there, but they knew that we are doing well here, and the cost of living is a lot lower than it is in San Francisco, and they had a place to land for a couple weeks while they're looking around. So, they, too, rented a U-Haul and came in. That happened to be right a week before our second daughter was born. She was born in July of 1983, and they came in at the end of June of 1983. So, my parents kind of languished a little bit in Milwaukee because they were extremely lucky. They got, when we came to Milwaukee, this new Golda Meir house. The new Jewish home was just opened, and it was Section 8 housing. They got the apartment, a brand-new apartment and again, something which they could never dream about in Russia, because they literally had one apartment in Russia, and this is the one you start your life in, and it's the one you usually die in. So, they got this apartment. It was right on the Lake Michigan, right in the middle … across the street from Jewish Community Center, across the street from lunches served there daily, and the pool, and the lake, and everything. They had it very well, but when my wife was pregnant with our third child, they finally decided to move, join us here because traveling back and forth, and seeing us only a couple of weeks a year was really not something they wanted to do. So, they came here right before my son was born, Jacob. So, they came in 1987, about February 1987. And just as a side note, I think at one point we were planning a party in the mid-1990s of all the people who came to Atlanta because of us, directly or indirectly. We were talking about 45 people between the immediate family, and the friends, and the ones we helped to come here, and the ones who ended up here, and the ones who came because of us. So, we have quite a large support network here. Your parents could be counted among those. They came here because of us, as did your grandparents, as did your uncle, and so on and so forth.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2930.0,3065.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/55","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e When you came to Atlanta, were you still involved with the Jewish community?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3065.0,3069.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/56","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e No, not at all. We were totally unaffiliated. As a matter of fact, our connection with the Jewishness at the time, besides the social aspect … I mean, we grew up as Jews, but we were social Jews. We felt ourselves different, unique, proud of the historical achievement of Jews, proud of Israel, happy for … very proud of things like the Six-Day War, and the Yom Kippur War, and [Mount] Tabor, and things like that. But we were not Jewish in any of Jewish traditions. Yes, the first year we were in Milwaukee, because we had these volunteers and we were kind of involved in this thing, we went to a seder and frankly, we got bored to death not knowing what it was. We happened to go to an Orthodox Jew, so the service was about three hours. We were 24 years old and totally unexposed to this stuff. The readings meant nothing to us, the words meant nothing to us. Nobody explained to us the story and what Passover is all about. I mean, in Russia, in USSR, Passover to us was eating matzah instead of bread. We didn't have a synagogue to go to. We didn't have the story, somebody to tell us about the seder and do all the stuff. So, it was a holiday, but we didn't really know what it was about. We knew that Rosh HaShanah was a new year. We knew that Yom Kippur was a special day, but that's about it. Now, of course we went to synagogue, but again, we went to the wrong kind of synagogue for us. We went to the Orthodox synagogue, which was where my wife had to sit separately from us. That didn't quite turn us into that. So, we were not really Jewishly involved. Then, of course, leaving Milwaukee and coming here totally cut off all of those things. Where our Jewishness started, we kind of came back to the Jewish stuff is when our daughter was born. We needed a ceremony to give her the Jewish name and things like that. So, we looked up Congregation Beth Shalom, which at the time, was on Chamblee Tucker Road, and Rabbi—I still remember his name—Peterson, he was a great guy. Soon after, he went to Israel. He came to our house in 1983, when our daughter was born, seven days, eight days, whatever, and basically gave her the name. We had the ceremony and everything else. This was our first exposure. So, we joined the synagogue, the Beth Shalom, and of course, our oldest daughter at the time was already six, so we started taking her to Sunday school there to get the Jewish exposure, Jewish education, things like that. With our lifestyle, going there on Sundays was about the only thing we could do. Now, we would go occasionally to services on Saturday, but most of our involvement was going to Sunday school, obviously paying for it, and so on and so forth. That was basically the extent of our official Jewish involvement into Jewish life until about mid-1980s, about 1987, 1988, when people started coming out again. Again, we would send our daughter to summer camp at Zaban Park. There was some Jewish connection, obviously, there. We were members of the synagogue, and she was going to Sunday school, but it was not very active, and it certainly was not anything to do with the Federation. Matter of fact, the Federation was a total enigma to us until this one day in Zaban Park. I believe it was probably 1987, where in Zaban Park, they had an Israel festival. I believe it was June. A representative of the Federation was speaking and they basically were saying that if you have friends and relatives in Soviet Union who want to leave, tell them to leave now because the doors are opening, and they are opening pretty wide, and now is the time to go, because this was at the end of the seven year period where nobody left. So, this is where we kind of got exposed a little bit to Federation. And then, there was a guy by the name Gene Adelman who [had] just moved from California to Atlanta, got involved with Federation, gave them a significant amount of money. We became friends with him. He got me involved in the Federation activities and introduced me to the concept of the Federation. And through him, I met a lot of wonderful people who were with me on the Resettlement Committee. Actually, I was with them on the Resettlement Committee and still friends with them until this day. That's how I got involved in the Federation. First, the Resettlement Committee, later on in the board of the Federation. Because we knew that the people are coming, we kind of, Gene and I tried to organize what we called the Russian Club. The Russian Club was a Federation-affiliated, informal Russian community thing. It's funny that now, there is R-A-F, Russian American Federation. HIAS sponsored the group, which is now kind of spreading its wings around Atlanta. They're trying to do the same thing we were trying to 15 years ago, except we were doing it informally. We were affiliated with the Federation, which helped us in some ways and didn't help us in others. The reason I'm saying helped us in some way is because we were involved with the Federation, we were able, for example, to come up with a reduced membership to Zaban Park. We were able to … I was helping to collect money for the Federation's campaign. I would talk to people and very often, I would run into people who had bad experiences with the Federation and wouldn't even hear about giving any money. But the Russian Club per se, we were getting together about once every month. It was basically 15 to 20 volunteers who would help the newcomers. At the time, newcomers were coming once a month, maybe a couple of families. So, they would quickly try to help the family. If there was an engineer and you knew somebody who was working along the same, you get them in touch. You know, if there was somebody who is maybe handy doing something … That type of stuff. Informal job placement. We were not trying to supplant Jewish Vocational Service, but we were certainly helping people by knowing what it takes to get that: how to write the resume, how to fill out an application, how to make a phone call, how to come to interview, and that type of stuff. So, that's how I got involved with Federation.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/57","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Did your wife continue to work as a hairdresser?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3434.0,3437.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/58","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e No, actually she went through a couple of years of that. After the maternity leave, she decided to come back to hairdressing. Things were kind of slow and she said, \"You know, I am a civil engineer by trade. Why don't I get a job related to that field?\" At the time, we're talking about 1985 probably. At the time, there was quite a need in drafters, and there was no CAD [Computer-Aided Design software] per se, just drafters. So, she was able to get a job as a drafter with a kind of entry-level salary. But she liked that type of stuff and she improved. But she realized, obviously, being a drafter after having an engineering education was a bit below her. So, she decided to quit and go to some other place. She went to a place where she ran into this wonderful Italian guy who said that she's no good as a drafter, but she could be a good engineer. So, he basically made her promise that she will go to school, to Georgia Tech, on a part-time basis, meaning she'll go a semester and then work for a semester. And that's how she started. I just finished my degree at Georgia Tech at the time when she went and got her degree there. Another, I guess, very important event for us and our Jewish involvement with the Federation was again with Gene Adelman. He suggested that we take a mission trip to Israel. This was not really something which we planned on, because there were a lot of other places we were dreaming about going to in Europe and everywhere else. But it just happened to be our very first trip abroad and it happened to be to Israel on an Atlanta Jewish Federation mission. It was a mission for the young people. We were young at the time. This was late 1988, I believe, maybe early 1989. And it was a wonderful trip. We made so many good friends. Some of them we still keep up with. This was under 40, a lot of singles and a lot of them got married since then. We were one of the only two or three married couples in the whole trip. We were also the only Russians. Coming to Israel in 1988 or 1989 in a group of 30 Americans was certainly a unique experience. We traveled. It was eight days, and first four days we were in Europe, which was also kind of interesting because we were in Holland, in Amsterdam, and went to all the requisite places, and all that stuff. We got a lot of friends there, made a lot of friends with the people in the group. Then, we spent eight days touring Israel, going through all the places, Golan Heights, and Lebanon border, and Haifa, and the whole thing basically. That was wonderful. When I came back, I got nominated to the Goldstein Young Leadership Program of the Federation. I went through the year-long program, and went to Israel again with that program, and that gave me a very good exposure to what the Federation does, and what the Jewish agencies are, and what they do, and where the money comes from. At the time, I was also involved with campaign every year. I was basically in charge of the Russian campaign, so I would call about three hundred four hundred people because by that time, I knew pretty much everybody in the Atlanta community except for some of the newcomers. [In the] early 1990s, when people started coming en masse, I kind of lost track. One day in 1990, I believe it was May 1990, where two planes came in from Italy, carrying probably 300 people. You can't know all of them, but some of them still run into us and say, \"Oh, I remember you met me in the airport when we came.\" But back in the late 1980s, when people were coming, maybe a couple of families every month, we could actually … I knew a lot of people here, most of the people who were here in Atlanta. We met all the newcomers. We would go to the airport, we would pick them up, we would drive, drop them at their apartment, and help them put together furniture, and then we'd come on Saturday after they arrived, and we would have a little meeting, and explain to people what's what, and where to go, and where to get, things like that. So, this was Russian Club, kind of an informal mission and things like that. We were kind of involved with that stuff. By the time I finished Goldstein leadership program, which was a year-long program, and we went to Israel at the end, and all that stuff, I knew pretty much how the Atlanta Jewish Federation operates, and works, and who's in charge, and all. Then, I got nominated to be on the board of the Federation, so I got to meet a lot of people, and come to meetings, and things like that. I think I was on the board for a year or two. I don't remember exactly how long.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3437.0,3727.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/59","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Okay, I think that we can end here, unless we are missing something.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3727.0,3733.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/60","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eBerman:\u003c/strong\u003e Is there any other aspect of your emigration from Russia to America that you would care to comment on? I mean, maybe just from even an emotional point of view, what it was like to come here and bring up your children here?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3733.0,3751.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/61","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e I guess one of the most interesting points and something which really got into focus later on was the legal mechanism of how we ended up here. Obviously, we were totally oblivious of that, totally ignorant of the fact how it all worked out and why we were allowed to come to the United States until basically early 1990s, when this whole way of getting in as a refugee, and automatically getting a green card within the year, and getting citizenship five years later was … It all became clear to us when people were no longer able to do that. I think what we did was wonderful. I think we definitely … I mean, I remember before we left, talking to some older people and they said … actually my own family. My grandfather back in the 1920s, when my father was very young, had a chance to emigrate in early 1920s, but he … I don't know. You could say he was too chicken. He decided not to. His brother, my grandfather's brother, who was emigrating somewhere to the United States, offered to take one of his kids. Thank G-d my grandfather had ten kids, so he had a few to give. He offered to take my dad, who was the youngest, or somebody else, and have kind of a beach hat in the United States and the reason to come. They didn't do it. Now, my parents, I think, had a chance to emigrate in mid-1950s when Poland was repatriating Jews. There was a very small window in 1957, 1958, 1959, where Jews, quote unquote, Polish Jews, the ones who were stuck in Russia, were allowed to come back to Poland. Now, very few of them stuck in Poland. I mean, we had some friends who quickly, through Warsaw, went to Austria, and then to Israel, and settled in Israel. My parents didn't take that chance. So, when in the mid-1970s we started talking about emigrating, we said, \"You know, one generation got to sacrifice itself,\" because obviously it's very disturbing. You're breaking your life, you start anew, you are deficient in language, you're deficient in social skills, you're starting in a new place. My grandparents didn't do that, didn't sacrifice themselves so that their kids will have a life, and my parents didn't it, so I guess it's our fate. But we didn't know really what helped us with that, the fact that we had the whole refugee status situation, which made it very easy to get in and qualify. We, obviously, later on realized when the Soviet Union fell apart and Russia became a free country, you no longer can come in as a refugee. You either come in as an immigrant, which is totally different, or … We went without any quotas. We went without any restrictions. We got a green card exactly a year after we arrived. We got citizenship five and a half years later. I mean, basically, as soon as we qualified for citizenship, we applied and it took about five, six months or so to get it basically.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3751.0,3939.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/62","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eBerman:\u003c/strong\u003e How did you feel becoming a citizen?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3939.0,3941.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/63","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Oh, very good. We finally had a passport. You see, again, there is a difference between the way we left in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and the way people left in the 1990s. People in the 1990s came with their own passports. They were able to sell their apartments, they were able sell their cars if they had them, or their garages, or their furniture. I mean, we had to get rid of everything and carry 35 kilograms [77 pounds] with us. When I say they sold it, I mean they got cash for them, they got money. They could come here and make a down payment on a place to live. They could buy a car. They didn't have to start with a $300 car like we did, which was falling apart. So, while we were not maybe 100 percent political or religious refugees … I mean, yes, we were not allowed to practice our religion. We had no idea what our religion was. We didn't have any chance of having that. But yet, we were totally stripped down to the bare bones before we left, before we allowed to leave, whereas a lot of people in mid- to late 1990s coming over here, they came on a direct flight. They didn't have to go through all the refugee resettlement steps and things like that, yet they came in here being citizens. They almost had a choice [of considering], \"Do I stay a Russian citizen until my passport expires, or do I become an American citizen?\" A lot of them, unfortunately, picked an interesting way of solving this by keeping the Russian citizenship and yet applying for green cards. The green card … They would never apply for the American citizenship, but the green card allows them to travel in and out, and they feel like they have a safe place here. They feel like [they have] a place to come if, G-d forbid, another putsch [a violent attempt to overthrow a government] starts in Russia, or another coup, or things turn real bad. Now, this is what's different between our, what they call wave, the third wave. We were leaving. We knew it's forever and between 1980, or actually late 1979 and early 1986, I think, January 10th, 1986, when we got our citizenship, we had no citizenship. We had … We were obviously legal aliens, resident aliens, but we had no citizenship per se. So, this was a very treasured thing for us. The fact that we got American passport, which to us was very … the height of protection, and the fact that we could travel, and we could enter most of the countries without visa, we can come back without any hassle, and all that stuff … But I think this was the end result of a totally different mindset. People leaving even in late 1980s were leaving forever. There was no coming back. We were branded traitors. We were talked about as traitors. We were basically treated like traitors. We didn't think we will … I mean, I was back since then. I went back to USSR, Russia in 1999 and 2001. But I didn't think it was going to happen because of the way the Soviet propaganda managed to turn it into a very big political thing. There were meetings. When I say meetings, I'm talking hundreds and thousands of people basically branding us as traitors [for] going to Israel, going to other countries. Things, of course, changed since then, but it's different. It was different for us.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3941.0,4151.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/64","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eBerman:\u003c/strong\u003e I just have one more question. What is the thing that you found to be the most … that has made it all worth it for you to leave what was your homeland—if that is how you felt about it—and come here?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4151.0,4168.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/65","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Well, it is homeland, of course, but I think what made it worth it is the fact that my kids are American and they are free. I guess one of the interesting things was when all three of my kids got bat mitzvah, bar mitzvahed, and it was a big event and everything. But I guess the thing which brought it into focus was when my oldest daughter started wearing kippah to high school. My parents were absolutely paranoid. Because you don't do that in Russia. You don't do that in the USSR. You don't do that. I mean, they were afraid she would be picked out, attacked, branded. She was 14 at the time and she said, \"Grandparents, it's fine. It's perfectly fine. You want to wear a kippah, you wear a kippah to this.\" It was not a kippah. It was basically kind of a kippah equivalent with her long hair, but you know, ours is a different generation. Our parents were petrified, we were concerned, and she's totally free. I mean, she feels like … And then, she went to Israel. She spent six weeks there and she loved it. You know, so this is the stuff which we could never dream about. Now, we didn't think that the changes in the USSR will be as significant as they are, but I don't think what we got here is attainable there: the type of freedom, the type of comfort, the type of confidence in the fact that the world is a small place, and they're always welcome, and they can solve every problem in the world, and they can travel to any part of the world, and they can do anything they want in this life.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4168.0,4269.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/66","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eBerman:\u003c/strong\u003e Do you see any other examples of how your kind of your psychology, having grown up as a faithful Komsomol member, and then your children growing up as American, is there any other thing that comes to mind?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4269.0,4285.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/67","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Another very interesting case was when my oldest daughter, again, went to Egypt and I think … That was recently. It was only three years ago. She finally understood what it meant to be a Jew in the Soviet Union, because she was a Jew in Egypt, in Cairo, at Passover time. Well, not just at Passover. Passover was just interesting because she decided to make her own matzah. Obviously, you cannot buy matzah in Egypt. She decided to do her own matzah, and she did, and actually wrote a story about it, and it was actually read on NPR [National Public Radio]. But she said there was an expat community where she was exposed to and by a wink, and a hunch, and a quiet word, and a turn, she figured out that some of them are Jewish and it became a very close bond. Then, all of a sudden, they had something else in common. And she said, \"I think I finally understood how you parents felt in Soviet Union. You know, you didn't go around advertising you're a Jew, but you kind of picked out your kin in the group.\" You know sometimes by the last name, sometimes by their words, sometimes by the jokes, sometimes by … Somehow, you figure it out. Sometimes, your parents told you that, \"He's probably Jewish. You know, she's probably Jewish.\" So, that was kind of interesting. Finally, I guess the most telling example for me and my wife at least was when we with our daughter … We were in Berlin [Germany] in 1992. She was 15 at the time. We took an overnight train to Prague [Czech Republic], a purely tourist destination. It was a trip from hell for a number of reasons, but it exposed her overnight, between midnight and six o'clock in the morning, basically, to the worst the Soviet system can show. This was Czech Republic after the Velvet Revolution, but it still had a lot of … And the train we took went from Berlin, to Prague, to Bulgaria, to all the Soviet countries basically, the Eastern European countries. At six o'clock in the morning, she said, \"Thank you for taking me out of that awful country. I don't think I could ever survive being there.\" And there was a number of reasons for that, but this was a heartfelt thing. I think that at that time, she realized what it took for us to make a step like that, and how good it all turned out for us, and how many opportunities it opened up for her, and the rest of my kids, of course, too.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4285.0,4448.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/68","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e Well, thank you very much …","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4448.0,4450.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/69","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e Oh, you're welcome. … for accepting this interview. Sure.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4450.0,4451.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/70","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eUnknown:\u003c/strong\u003e … for accepting this interview. Sure.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4451.0,4451.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/71","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eShmukler:\u003c/strong\u003e … for accepting this interview. Sure.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4451.0,4451.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/transcript/89693/annotation/72","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cstrong\u003eBerman:\u003c/strong\u003e … for accepting this interview. Sure. Thank you.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4451.0,4455.0"}]},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["Annotations [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/73","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eLvov [Polish: Lwów; Ukrainian: Lviv] was once a Polish town. It is approximately 220 miles (350 km) east of Krakow and 212 miles (341 km) southeast of Warsaw. The city was occupied by the Soviet Union on September 22, 1939. It was immediately annexed together with the rest of Eastern Galicia under the terms of the German Soviet Pact. The Germans subsequently occupied Lvov after the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 and renamed the town “Lemberg.” The Soviet army reentered Lvov in July 1944. Since World War II, the city has been part of Ukraine and is known as “Lviv.”\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/74","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eBefore World War II, Lvov [Polish: Lwów; Ukrainian: Lviv] was a major Jewish center in Eastern Europe, with a community dating back to the 13th century. Between 150,000 and 200,000 Jews, including many refugees, lived in Lvov when the Germans occupied the city in 1941. By the Russian liberation in 1944, only 2,571 Jews remained, most of whom soon left. Under Soviet rule, about 28,000 Jews, mainly from elsewhere in the USSR, lived in Lvov, but public Jewish life was increasingly restricted, culminating in the closure of the city’s main synagogue in the 1960s. Jewish life began to revive in the late 1990s, after Ukraine's independence. Though many had left, a small Jewish community remains today.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/75","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eIn September 1941, the Germans established an arms factory on Janowska Road in the northwestern suburbs of Lvov, in southeastern Poland. Soon after, they expanded it into a network of factories as part of the German Armaments Works (DAW) and it became the Janowska labor camp. In addition to being a forced-labor camp for Jews, Janowska was a transit camp during the mass deportations of Polish Jews to extermination camps in 1942. Thousands of Jews from the Lvov ghetto were deported to Janowska. Those classified as fit to work remained at Janowska for forced labor. Those unfit for work were sent to Belzec and killed or taken to a nearby ravine and shot. The evacuation of the Janowska camp began in November 1943. The SS staff and their local auxiliaries murdered at least 6,000 Jews.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/76","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eDuring the 1950s-1970s, antisemitism in Ukraine was driven by Soviet policy and propaganda aimed at suppressing Jewish identity and limiting participation in public life. Anti-religious and anti-Zionist rhetoric led to purges, job discrimination, and exclusion from the Communist Party. State atheism marginalized Jewish communities through property confiscation and synagogue closures. By the 1970s, institutional barriers, propaganda, and widespread discrimination encouraged Jewish emigration and reduced the Jewish population. Although state-run violence was rare, systemic bias continued with little acknowledgment of local antisemitism or Holocaust collaboration.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/77","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eYom Kippur [Hebrew: day of atonement] is the most sacred day of the Jewish year. Most of the 25-hour fast day is spent in prayer, reciting yizkor for deceased relatives, confessing sins, requesting divine forgiveness, and listening to Torahreadings and sermons. People greet each other with the wish that they may be sealed in the heavenly book for a good year ahead. The day ends with the blowing of the shofar (a ram’s horn).\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/78","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003ePesach\u003cbr\u003e [Hebrew: Passover] is the celebration of Israel’s liberation from Egyptian bondage. The holiday lasts for eight days. Matzah or matzo, and unleavened flatbread is eaten in memory of the unleavened bread prepared by the Israelites during their hasty flight from Egypt, when they had not time to wait for the dough to rise. On the first two nights of Passover, the seder, the central event of the holiday, is celebrated.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/79","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eRosh HaShanah\u003cbr\u003e [Hebrew: head of the year] begins the cycle of High Holy Days. It introduces the Ten Days of Penitence, when Jews examine their souls and take stock of their actions. On the tenth day is Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. The tradition is that on Rosh HaShanah, G-d sits in judgment on humanity. Then the fate of every living creature is inscribed in the Book of Life or the Book of Death. Prayer and repentance before the sealing of the books on Yom Kippurmay revoke these decisions.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/80","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eKaddish\u003cbr\u003e [Hebrew: holy] is a hymn of praises to G-d found in the Jewish prayer service that is recited aloud while standing. The central theme of the Kaddish is the magnification and sanctification of G-d's name. Along with the Shemaand Amidah, Kaddish is one of the most important and central elements in the Jewish liturgy. Mourner's Kaddish is said at all prayer services and certain other occasions. Following the death of a parent, child, spouse, or sibling it is customary to recite the Mourner's Kaddish in the presence of a congregation daily for 30 days, or 11 months in the case of a parent, and then at every anniversary of the death. It is important to note that the Mourner's Kaddish does not mention death at all, but instead praises G-d.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/81","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eGomel (or Homyel) \u003cbr\u003eis a city in southeastern Belarus, where a vibrant Jewish community has existed since the 14th century. In 1939, \u003cbr\u003ethe Jewish population in Gomel was 40,880 (29 percent of the total), most of whom were killed in the Holocaust. After the war, Jews returned to Gomel. In 1959, there were about 25,000 Jews living in Gomel. Jewish public life was severely restricted under the Soviets in the 1960s, with synagogues closed or repurposed and artifacts such as Torah scrolls seized. In the 1990s most of Gomel’s Jews emigrated to Israel, the United States or Germany. By 2000, the Jewish population had dwindled to around 4,000.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/82","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eFrancisk Skorina Gomel State University is a medium-sized university in Gomel, Belarus. It was opened in 1930.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/83","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe 1980 Summer Olympics were held in Moscow from July 19 to August 3. The United States, protesting the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, led a boycott joined by Canada, West Germany, Israel, most Islamic nations, and others. Many athletes and teams were absent, lowering competition and highlighting Cold War tensions. In turn, the Soviet Union and its allies boycotted the 1984 Los Angeles Games.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/84","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Soviet–Afghan War lasted from December 1979 to February 1989, beginning when the Soviet Union sent troops to support Afghanistan's government against the mujahideen, who were backed by the US, Pakistan, and others. The conflict marked a turning point in the Cold War, worsening superpower relations and contributing to an arms buildup. After the Soviets withdrew, Afghanistan was left devastated, sparking ongoing civil war and the emergence of groups like the Taliban and al-Qaeda. The prolonged war strained Soviet resources and morale, helping lead to the USSR’s collapse in 1991.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/85","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Union of Soviet Socialist Republic/USSR was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. It was made up of fifteen national republics. It was a communist state with the capital in Moscow. The nation had it foundation in the October Revolution of 1917, when the Bolsheviks established the Russian Soviet Republic. In 1922, the Bolsheviks and Vladmir Lenin proved victorious in the Russian Civil War and formed the Soviet Union. After Lenin’s death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power. Under his rule the country saw rapid industrialization and forced collectivization, which resulted in economic growth but also famine that killed millions. Stalin also conducted the Great Purge, which removed actual and perceived opponents. After the World War II, the Cold War began with the Eastern Bloc of the Soviet Union confronting the Western Bloc, which was led by the United States and eventually NATO. In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union’s last leader Mikhail Gorbachev sought to implement various reforms. Additionally various Soviet satellite countries overthrew their Marxist-Leninist regimes. By 1991, a coup attempt against Gorbachev failed and the Soviet Union collapsed with various republics of the Soviet Union remerging as independent nations.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=31.0,221.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/86","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eSoviet Jewish immigration to the United States occurred primarily in two major waves between the 1970s and the 1990s, totaling over 700,000 people fleeing religious repression and seeking better economic opportunities. These, often highly educated, immigrants largely arrived in the 1970s and, with the fall of the Soviet Union, between 1987 and 1995.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=243.0,393.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/87","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003e“Hava Nagila” is a Jewish folk song traditionally sung at celebrations.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=243.0,393.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/88","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eA chuppah [Hebrew: canopy] is the canopy under which a Jewish wedding takes place.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=243.0,393.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/89","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eA ketubah is a Jewish marriage contract that is signed just prior to the wedding ceremony. The ketubah outlines the rights and responsibilities of the groom, in relation to the bride.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=243.0,393.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/90","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eGefilte fish is a dish like a meatloaf, made from ground fish, onions, starch and eggs. It is traditionally enjoyed by Ashkenazi Jews on Shabbat and Jewish holidays. \u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=410.0,557.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/91","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Six-Day War, also known as the June War, or 1967 War was a brief, but bloody, Arab Israeli conflict that took place June 5–10, 1967. It was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab states. It ended with Israel capturing the Sinai Peninsula, the Golan Heights, the Gaza Strip, and the West Bank, including East Jerusalem.  \u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=410.0,557.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/92","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Yom Kippur War was fought by the coalition of Arab states led by Egypt and Syria against Israel from October 6 to 25, 1973. The Arabs launched a surprise attack on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in Judaism. Egyptian and Syrian forces crossed ceasefire lines to enter the Sinai Peninsula and the Golan Heights, which had been captured by Israel in the 1967 Six­Day War. The Israelis managed to halt the Egyptian offensive and then forced them back to the pre­war lines. After the cease fire the Israelis withdrew from the Sinai Peninsula.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=410.0,557.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/93","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eMikhail Gorbachev (1931-2022) was a Russian and Soviet politician who served as the last leader of the Soviet Union. He held to Marxism-Leninism ideology, but he moved towards social democracy by the early 1990's. He pushed for a policy of glasnost (openness) which allowed for greater freedom of speech and press. He also implemented perestroika (restructuring) which worked towards decentralized economic decision-making to improve efficiency. His efforts in the Soviet Union led to various Eastern Bloc countries abandoning Marxist-Leninist government and he refused to intervene militarily. Eventually, leading Marxist-Leninist hardliners launched an unsuccessful coup attempt against him. The coup attempt led to the dissolution of the Soviet Union and his resignation as President. Gorbachev was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and was praised for his role in ending the Cold War.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=841.0,991.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/94","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Soviet Armed forces relied on the mandatory two-year conscription of young men. During the Soviet-Afghanistan War, the Soviet Union relied heavily on conscription for its forces.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=841.0,991.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/95","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe All-Union Leninist Young Communist League, usually known as Komsomol, was a political youth organization in the Soviet Union. It is sometimes described as the youth division of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), although it was officially independent and referred to as \"the helper and the reserve of the CPSU\". The Komsomol in its earliest form was established in urban areas in 1918. During the early years, it was a Russian organization, known as the Russian Young Communist League, or RKSM. During 1922, with the unification of the USSR, it was reformed into an all-union agency, the youth division of the All-Union Communist Party. It was the final stage of three youth organizations with members up to age 28, graduated at 14 from the Young Pioneers, and at nine from the Little Octobrists.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1010.0,1530.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/96","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Jewish Agency for Israel, also known as Sokhnut [Hebrew: the agency], is the largest Jewish nonprofit organization in the world. Previously called the Palestine Zionist Executive, it was designated in 1929 as the \"Jewish agency\" provided for in the League of Nations' Palestine Mandate. The Jewish Agency played a central role in the founding and the building of the State of Israel and continues to serve as the main link between Israel and Jewish communities around the world. Since 1948, the Jewish Agency for Israel has been responsible for bringing 3 million immigrants to Israel.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1536.0,1742.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/97","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) is a Jewish American non-profit that provides assistance to refugees. Founded in 1881, its original purpose was the help the flow of Jewish immigrants from Russia in relocating. During and after World War II, they had offices throughout Europe, South and Central America and the Far East. They worked to get Jews out of Europe and to any country that would have them by providing tickets and information about visas. After World War II, they assisted 167,000 Jews to leave DP camps and emigrate elsewhere. In 1975, the US State Department asked the organization to assist the incoming Vietnam refugees. Today, the organization continues to provide support to refugees and immigrates of all nationalities, ethnicities, and religions. The organization also works with people whose lives and freedom are believed to be at risk due to war, persecution, or violence. HIAS has offices in the United States and across Latin America, Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. Since its inception, HIAS has helped resettle more than 4.5 million people.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1745.0,1897.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/98","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (commonly called “the Joint”) is a worldwide Jewish relief organization headquartered in New York. It was established in 1914. After World War II, the Joint provided desperately needed supplies and necessities to survivors inside and outside of DP camps in Eastern Europe, Hungary, Poland and Romania. Long: A worldwide Jewish relief organization headquartered in New York. It was established in 1914. Before World War II, it sent funds to subsidize medical care, schools, vocational training, welfare programs and emigration efforts to beleaguered Jews in Europe. During the Nazi era, they tried to get Jewish refugees out to anywhere that would have them including the United States, Palestine, and Latin America. When war broke out they helped thousands of Jews in Poland with shelters and soup kitchens, hospitals, and educational and cultural programs. When the United States entered the war in 1941, the Joint shifted gears since it was not allowed to operate legally in enemy countries. They used international connections to channel aid to Jews in conquered Europe. Wartime headquarters were set up in Lisbon, Portugal from which the Joint mounted rescue operations for desperate refugees including sponsoring a program to get 15,000 Jews from Europe to Shanghai, China. After the war, the Joint provided desperately needed supplies and necessities to survivors. More than 227 million pounds of food, medicine, clothing and other supplies were shipped to Europe to survivors inside and outside of DP camps in Eastern Europe, Hungary, Poland and Romania.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1745.0,1897.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/99","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eBetween 1948 and 1953, Soviet Jews were singled out in an anti-cosmopolitan campaign, which was an anti-Western campaign during the early years of the Cold War. “Cosmopolitan” was a Soviet euphemism for individuals or groups that lacked allegiance to the Soviet Union and was applied mostly to Jewish intellectuals. Many Soviet Jews were publicly persecuted, and many lost their jobs, were imprisoned, or worse.  \u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1745.0,1897.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/100","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eLadispoli is an Italian town situated about 35 kilometers (22 miles) west of Rome on the coast of the Tyrrhenian Sea.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1745.0,1897.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/101","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eOdnoetazhnaya Amerika\u003cbr\u003e [Russian: One-storied America] is a 1937 travelogue by Soviet authors Ilf and Petrov. The book, known for its humorous style, offers a nuanced view of the United States. It praises American entrepreneurial spirit and economic progress while criticizing the treatment of Black Americans, Native Americans, and workers. The title reflects their observation that most American cities consist of low-rise buildings, contrary to the stereotype of skyscraper-filled skylines.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1935.0,2107.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/102","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eIn the early 1980’s, a severe economic recession impacted much of the world. It started approximately in 1980 and ran through 1982. The impact of the recession contributed to the Latin American debt crisis, long-lasting slowdowns in the Caribbean and Sub-Saharan African countries, and the United States savings and loan crisis. It is widely considered to have been the most severe recession since World War II.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=1935.0,2107.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/103","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eInternational Workers' Solidarity Day was a major holiday in the Soviet Union celebrated on May 1. The holiday featured massive parades and speeches meant to honor labor and socialist unity.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2117.0,2363.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/104","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eCOBOL [Common Business-Oriented Language] is a computer programming language developed in 1959 for business, finance, and administrative data processing.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2373.0,2688.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/105","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Rust Belt (also known as the Manufacturing Belt, Steel Belt or Factory Belt) is a region in the Northeastern and Midwestern United States that includes states like Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Illinois. Once the heart of the country’s coal, steel, and manufacturing industries, it saw significant industrial decline, population loss, and economic decay in the late 20th century.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2688.0,2803.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/106","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eGolda Mabovich Meir (1898-1978) was an Israeli teacher, politician, and the fourth Prime Minister of Israel. A native of Kiev, Ukraine, she was raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and immigrated to Mandatory Palestine in 1921 with her husband Morris Meyerson (1893-1951) and the couple Hebraized their name to Meir. She later became Israel’s Ambassador to the Soviet Union, Minister of Labor, and Foreign Minister before her election as Prime Minister in 1969, a position she held until 1974. To date (2026), she is the only woman to have served as Prime Minister of Israel.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2930.0,3065.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/107","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eFormerly known as Section 8, the Housing Choice Voucher program is a federal initiative that assists low-income individuals, families, the elderly, and disabled persons with rental assistance.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=2930.0,3065.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/108","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eMount Tabor, sometimes spelled Mount Thabor, is a large hill of biblical significance located in the Lower Galilee region of Israel. It lies at the eastern end of the Jezreel Valley, approximately 18 kilometers (11 miles) west of the Sea of Galilee. Mount Tabor is renowned as the site of the defeat of the Canaanite army by 10,000 Israelites under the leadership of Deborah and Barak, around 1285 BC.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/109","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eSeder\u003cbr\u003e [Hebrew: order] is a Jewish ritual feast that marks the beginning of the Jewish holiday of Passover. It is conducted on the evening of the fifteenth day of Nisan in the Hebrew calendar throughout the world. Some communities hold sederson the first two nights of Passover. The seder incorporates prayers, candle lighting, and traditional foods symbolizing the slavery of the Jews and the exodus from Egypt. It is one of the most colorful and joyous occasions in Jewish life.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/110","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eOrthodox Judaism is a traditional branch of Judaism that strictly follows the written Torah and the oral law concerning prayer, dress, food, sex, family relations, social behavior, the Sabbath day, holidays, and more.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/111","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003ePassover [Hebrew: Pesach] is the anniversary of Israel’s liberation from Egyptian bondage. Although enslaved by the Pharaoh, the Israelites continued to survive and even increase in numbers. Dismayed, the Pharaoh declared that all sons born to Hebrew women must be killed, but Hebrew midwives defied the Pharaoh’s decree. One mother, who had given birth to a son, placed him in a basket in the Nile River. The baby was found by none other than the Pharaoh’s daughter, who scooped him up, named him Moses, and raised him as her own. When Moses had grown up, G-d spoke to Moses saying that he, along with his brother Aaron, would be the one to take the Israelites out of Egypt. Moses challenged the Pharaoh, demanding freedom for the Israelites. When the Pharaoh refused, G-d sent a series of plagues upon the Pharaoh and Egyptian people. There were 10 plagues in total: blood, frogs, lice, wild beasts, diseases, boils, hail, locusts, darkness, and the most severe of all, the death of every Egyptian first-born son. To protect the Israelite children from the Angel of Death, the Israelites marked their doors with lamb’s blood, so that their houses would be passed over (hence the holiday name, “Passover”). Finally, Pharaoh surrendered and ordered the Israelites to leave Egypt. The Israelites were in such a hurry to leave Egypt that their bread had no time to rise. Pharaoh had also soon changed his mind and sent his armies after the Israelites. When the Israelites came to the Red Sea, they were trapped until G-d miraculously parted the sea. As soon as they passed through, the sea closed, saving them from the Egyptians and beginning the Israelites’ epic journey to the Promised Land.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/112","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eJewish babies are given Hebrew names shortly after they are born. A brief ceremony is performed, which often includes friends and family members of the new baby. Ashkenazi Jews often select a name that commemorates a deceased relative of the baby to honor that person’s memory. Sephardic Jews often follow the custom of naming their children after living relatives. Blessings are recited for the baby’s well-being. The traditional wish is offered—that this child may grow into a life of study of Torah, of loving relationships, and the performance of good deeds. Boys are usually named at the same time as they are circumcised. Girls can be named any time in the first few weeks.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/113","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eCongregation Beth Shalom is a Conservative synagogue on Winters Chapel Road in Atlanta.  The congregation was founded in 1975. While construction of the congregation’s first permanent home in suburban DeKalb County was underway, a cross-burning occurred at the site in full view of more than 75 members of the congregation, including children, who were attending Friday evening services at an elementary school across the street. The synagogue was completed and dedicated in 1981.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/114","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eZaban Park is a 52-acre recreation center located in Dunwoody, Georgia, part of the Marcus Jewish Community Center of Atlanta. The park has a fitness center, indoor and outdoor pool, boating and fishing lake, ball fields, gymnasiums, and courts. It is named for community leader Erwin Zaban, who donated and raised money for the undeveloped land where the park is now located in 1961.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/115","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eFollowing the 1980 Refugee Act, the Atlanta Jewish Federation Resettlement Committee was heavily engaged in settling Soviet Jewish refugees. The committee provided housing, English classes, and employment assistance, with efforts intensifying toward the end of the decade.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/116","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Russian American Federation Inc. is a non-profit organization established in 2004 to support the Russian-speaking community in Atlanta.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/117","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Jewish Vocational Service was founded in 1938. Its mission was to provide support, skills training, and job placement services. In 1997, it merged with Jewish Family Services to become Jewish Family \u0026amp; Career Services.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3069.0,3434.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/118","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eGeorgia Institute of Technology, which is commonly referred to as Georgia Tech is a public research university and institute of technology in Atlanta. It was founded in 1885 during Reconstruction as part of the plan to build an industrial economy in the post-Civil War South.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3437.0,3727.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/119","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Jewish Federation of Greater Atlanta hosts the Young Leadership Division (YLD), which provides leadership development and opportunities for community service to young adults aged 22-40. \u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3437.0,3727.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/120","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eBetween 1955 and 1959, approximately 18,743 Jews were repatriated from the Soviet Union to Poland. Many were originally Polish nationals who had been deported or fled during World War II. The majority used the opportunity as a circuitous path to emigrate to Israel. \u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=3751.0,3939.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/121","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eA bat mitzvah [Hebrew: daughter of commandments] is a rite of passage for Jewish girls aged 12 years and one day according to her Hebrew birthday. Many girls have their bat mitzvah around age 13, the same as boys who have their bar mitzvah at that age. The bat mitzvah girl is now duty bound to keep the commandments. Synagogue ceremonies are held for bat mitzvah girls in Reform and Conservative communities, but it has not won the approval of Orthodox rabbis.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4168.0,4269.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/122","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eA bar mitzvah [Hebrew: son of commandments] is a rite of passage for Jewish boys aged 13 years and one day. At that time, a Jewish boy is considered a responsible adult for most religious purposes. He is now duty-bound to keep the commandments, he puts on tefillin and may be counted to the minyan quorum for public worship. He celebrates being called up to the reading of the Torah in the synagogue, usually on the next available Sabbath after his Hebrew birthday.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4168.0,4269.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/123","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eJewish men cover their heads during prayer with a small skullcap called a kippah [Hebrew] or yarmulke/yamaka[Yiddish]. Orthodox Jewish men always wear it to remind themselves of G-d’s presence.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4168.0,4269.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/124","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe history of Jews in Egypt extends back to Biblical times, with Jewish communities contributing significantly to Egyptian society, especially during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. However, British imperialism after World War I fostered a climate of increasing Egyptian nationalism and the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 triggered strong anti-Jewish sentiment, leading to emigration and expulsions. Egypt's Jewish population, which had reached 80,000 in 1948, fell sharply to about 15,000 by 1957 due to the aftermath of the Arab-Israeli War and the 1956 Suez Crisis. The Six-Day War of 1967 prompted another wave of persecution, reducing the population to just 2,500. By the 1970s, most of the remaining Jews were permitted to leave Egypt, and only a few families remained. As of 2026, Jewish life in Egypt is virtually nonexistent, with fewer than 100 Jews, mostly elderly women, still residing in Cairo and Alexandria.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4285.0,4448.0"},{"id":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325/annotation_set/2337/annotation/125","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003eThe Velvet Revolution, also called the Gentle Revolution, was a peaceful transfer of power that occurred in Czechoslovakia from November 17 to 28, 1989. Sparked by a harsh police response to a student protest in Prague, anti-Communist demonstrations swept the country, pressuring the Communist Party to resign by late November. In 1993, the country split, forming the independent Czech Republic and Slovakia.\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://thebreman.aviaryplatform.com/collections/994/collection_resources/166155/file/302325#t=4285.0,4448.0"}]}]}]}